They've been warning all TV viewers for months. Did I listen? Nope. For months, the FCC has warned America that analog TV's will no longer work without a digital converter. Being stubborn, I tried to pretend that the digital switch would affect every TV viewer in America except me.

Actually, our family has been missing about 20 channels for the past three months. We've just been putting off getting a converter while desperately clinging to our few channels remaining. When the final conversion occurred on Friday, millions of TVs across the country went black, including ours. We finally went down to Comcast today to get our digital converters.

They gave us a kit with a digital converter box, a few cables and a remote. The thing with the remote is that you have to program it to work on your TV. You press the set button, wait for the lights to blink, then punch in a 5 digit code. I'll have to admit, this remote is getting on my last nerve. The new remote is supposed to do everything, but it just will not cooperate. I have to use my old remote to turn my TV on and off and to adjust the volume. I have to use my new remote to change the channels.

So I've had my converter for a few hours now. Biggest pro: more channels. I now get about 600 channels in my bedroom (most of them are rubbish infomercial channels). Biggest cons: It takes forever to channel surf because the picture lags when you change the channel. Also, I now have to keep track of two remotes instead of one and there's a little box on my TV with a shiny green light glaring at me. It looks kind of creepy.

Sorry for the crappy picture. I took it with my Mac.